


The Comedy Is That It's Serious

by victoria_p (musesfool)



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Consent Issues, M/M, Sex Pollen, Ten in Ten Challenge
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-23
Updated: 2013-09-23
Packaged: 2017-12-27 09:55:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,783
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/977400
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/musesfool/pseuds/victoria_p
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which the Winter Soldier is strangely affectionate, Captain America is completely baffled, and the Black Widow is tremendously amused.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Comedy Is That It's Serious

**Author's Note:**

> Contains sex pollen and consent issues. Inspired by the trope meme. Also for the 10 in 10 challenge. Title from Jason Mraz. Thanks to the folks who provided silly Russian endearments.

On the walk to the quinjet, Fury presses a pair of syrettes into Steve's hand. Steve looks at them and then back up at Fury. "Morphine, sir?"

"Not exactly. One should knock him out without killing him, and keep him out until you get him back to a holding cell. If he wakes up," Fury pauses ominously, but then, he does most things ominously and Steve's mostly inured to it at this point, "the side effects can be difficult to handle, but I'm sure you'll manage." He claps Steve on the shoulder with false heartiness, and Steve can only wonder what it is about this Winter Soldier fella that has everyone panicked. Sure, according to the briefing, he's killed a lot of people, but they're all formidable fighters on their own, and even more so as a team. 

The fact that Natasha-- _Natasha_ , of all people--is white as a sheet and clearly operating under the strain of strong emotion is enough to make Steve wary, and even Tony has picked up on the tension, because after the first remark gets him a terrifying, flat-eyed stare from Natasha, he shuts up.

The quinjet drops them at the HYDRA base, so like the ones Steve spent so much time destroying in the Forties that he pauses and has to stop himself from doing a double-take. 

"Cap?" Clint asks, concerned.

"They haven't changed much, have they?"

"No, but that makes it easier for us," Tony answers from somewhere above them.

Which is of course when it all goes to shit.

According to the intel Fury had given them, there was only supposed to be a skeleton crew at this base, but they swarm the way HYRDA agents always do, and fight like the Red Skull himself is there driving them on. Steve's not sure when he gets separated from Natasha, and his comm is giving him nothing but intermittent static and the occasional Hulk-roar, but he finds himself in the command center, along with the guy they're looking for, if the metal arm and the guns are anything to go by.

The metal arm is a good match for the shield, and Steve finds himself in an honest-to-god hand-to-hand brawl with someone almost as strong as he is for the first time in a long time. He tears at the facemask, trying to find a spot to use the syrettes, and it comes off in his hand as another punch from the metal arm sends him flying.

Steve looks up, and even though he's across the room, he feels like he's been punched in the gut again, all the breath knocked right out of him. Because the guy under the mask is _Bucky_. 

"Bucky?"

The Winter Soldier shoves his goggles up onto his forehead and says, "Who the hell is Bucky?"

"I've got to get you out of here." He feels that sense of déjà vu again, but this time, instead of being too weak to stand on his own as the factory comes down around their ears, Bucky is snarling and fighting him. He doesn't know who Steve is, who _he_ is, and it's breaking Steve's heart. Steve's determined to take him home safely, though, alive and ready to be helped.

He ducks in under the next punch Bucky throws and jabs him in the neck with one of the syrettes Fury provided, hoping it works the way Fury said. Bucky barks out something in Russian that is probably a nasty profanity, and then his knees buckle and he collapses against Steve in a limp heap.

Steve manages to collect him up without doing too much damage, though he's heavier than Steve ever remembers him being. Steve wonders how much more than his left arm is made of metal now. 

And then he doesn't have time to wonder about anything else, because the ceiling comes down, and everything goes dark for a bit.

*

Steve comes to with klaxons and emergency lights blaring, the familiar scent of Bucky's hair in his nose, and the unfamiliar feel of Bucky's lips pressed to his throat. 

"Uh, Buck?" Steve manages, blinking dust and spots out of his eyes, before all the details come back. It's 2013, they're buried under some HYDRA base, and Bucky is a Russian assassin codenamed the Winter Soldier. 

Sometimes, Steve doesn't understand how his life got so _strange_. Right now, though, he's just grateful that it has.

Bucky's lips move to Steve's ear and he murmurs something in Russian. Steve can't translate it (he makes a note to start Russian lessons as soon as they get out of here), but the insinuating tone is familiar from dozens of nights when they were young and Bucky was trying to convince Steve to go out, or some girl to go home with him. And then Bucky presses his mouth to Steve's, tongue licking insistently at his lips, and Steve lets him in, the way he's always wanted to. He takes a brief second to think he must still be knocked out, because this is the kind of thing he only ever fantasized about in the darkness of his own head, after lights out, hoping God would forgive him, because he was afraid Bucky never would.

The touch of Bucky's tongue against his sends heat blazing through him, and he sighs into Bucky's mouth. Bucky's palms are pressed flat against his chest, the tips of his fingers seeking purchase in the tight, slick material of Steve's uniform. Steve brings a hand up to curl in Bucky's hair, longer now than he can ever remember seeing it, soft and silky as it slips through his fingers. He remembers cutting it, Bucky sitting with a towel draped over his shoulders, jokingly asking Steve to take a little off the top.

He moans softly when Bucky's hand slides down his body to cup him through his uniform, and they pant into each other's mouths for a long moment before Steve remembers that this isn't real--Bucky doesn't remember who he is and he doesn't remember Steve and even if he did, he's never _wanted_ Steve, not like this, not the way Steve wants him. It's whatever was in that syrette that's doing this to him, and Steve can't take advantage, even if it's everything he's wanted since he was fourteen and discovered what wanting was.

He pulls back and licks his lips, which feel swollen and tingly, and tries to catch his breath. Bucky murmurs something else in Russian and pulls him into another heated kiss, his hand still rubbing at Steve's dick, which is definitely interested in the friction, even through the cup he's wearing.

"No," he says, breaking away and firmly removing Bucky's hand from his person. "We can't--We have to get out of here." He hauls them both upright, marveling again at how Bucky's filled out since the last time they saw each other. He'd always been lean and lithe, but they'd never had enough to eat growing up, and it had been just as bad sometimes during the war, when Bucky would forget that Steve wasn't small and sickly, and insist on sharing his own food, sneaking extra onto Steve's plate when he thought Steve wasn't looking. He'd said it was because of Steve's souped up metabolism, and while it was true Steve needed more fuel than the rest of them, he'd never wanted to take more than his fair share, especially not when it was coming out of Bucky's.

Bucky laughs, his breath a warm puff of air on Steve's skin. "Bossy, aren't you, zaichik?"

Steve rolls his eyes, but when he lets go of Bucky to try to start digging them out of the debris, Bucky collapses again. Steve pulls him up again, wrapping one arm around his waist, and Bucky sags against him, murmuring against his skin in Russian. Using his free arm, Steve begins clearing a path towards the exit, but it's not easy with Bucky clinging to him like an overly affectionate limpet, his hands roaming over Steve's chest and belly, as if he actually remembers all of Steve's sensitive and ticklish spots, and his lips pressing kisses up and down Steve's neck.

Once he finds the shield, it's a little easier, and Bucky occasionally helps, breaking up bits of fallen debris with his metal hand before he goes back to groping Steve.

Whatever that drug was, the side effects are definitely hard to handle. Steve will be having some very stern words with Director Fury when he gets back to the Helicarrier.

They make it out into the corridor and Steve props Bucky up against a wall for a few moments so he can catch his breath and figure out where they are in the complex. There's still nothing but static on his comm, but that could just be because of how far underground they are.

Bucky gives him a breathtaking grin and says, "They didn't tell me how pretty you were."

"Excuse me?"

"When they sent me to kill you. They didn't mention," he waves his hand at Steve and gives him a thoroughly lascivious onceover, "this."

Over the years, Steve had heard essays about dames Bucky was attracted to, but he'd never once rhapsodized about a fella. It just reminds Steve that this is some weird drug-induced haze of lust, and that it doesn't mean anything. Still, if he can't take advantage physically, he might as well try an interrogation. Bucky's remarkably pliant at the moment. He represses his disgust with himself because he needs answers and this might be the only way he'll ever get them.

"Who sent you?" Steve asks, trying to sound casual as he slings his shield onto his back and then drapes Bucky's right arm over his shoulder.

"No, no, no," Bucky says, his faint Russian accent charming as he teases. "We will have a quid pro quo, Captain. I will answer if you give me a kiss. For each kiss, another answer." He tugs Steve's chin down, the metal fingers warm and oddly textured against Steve's skin, and kisses him fiercely. Now Steve's knees feel like they might buckle. "The man who sent me is named Alexander Lukin."

The name means nothing to Steve, but he says, "Okay." He gets them moving again, through winding corridors filled with the detritus of battle. 

"Don't you want more answers?" Bucky asks breathlessly, rubbing himself against Steve's hip. "I definitely want more kisses."

"We need to keep moving," Steve says, avoiding the question. "The rest of this place is going to come down on us any second." A small avalanche of dust and grit cascades from the ceiling, as if proving his point. Bucky sighs in resignation and lets Steve drag him along without complaint.

Occasionally, though, Bucky stops him with a kiss and a murmured endearment, and since it keeps him docile, Steve allows it. Each time, he closes his eyes and wishes that true love's kiss were a real thing, and that it could fix whatever is wrong with Bucky, but he knows they live in the real world, not a fairy tale, and if Bucky were himself, he would be horrified by his behavior (and not just the assassinations, though Steve's pretty sure he'd be horrified by those too).

They lurch around another corner, and this time, Bucky tangles his hands in Steve's hair and presses a thigh between Steve's legs when they kiss. Steve moans softly and kisses him back hungrily. Bucky kisses his way up Steve's jaw to his ear, punctuating each kiss with a soft murmur, and Steve's lost in sensation for a while, before the sound of laughter startles him back to himself.

Natasha is watching them, arms folded across her chest and shoulders shaking with laughter. "Yasha," she says, lifting a hand to her lips as if trying to smother the sounds she's making, "this is not your usual M.O."

"Natalia, I don't care what our orders are, we are not hurting the Captain." Bucky whirls, lightning-fast, keeping himself between Steve and Natasha and pointing the gun from Steve's hip at Natasha's face. Steve kicks himself for not paying attention to where Bucky's hands were, but Natasha plucks the gun from his shaking fingers and hands it back to Steve.

"Great," Steve says. "I am all for the plan not to hurt me. Now, let's get outside before this place collapses for good."

"And then I will finally have my way with you," Bucky says, palming Steve's ass and making him yelp and jump. Then he sags against Steve again, his eyes fluttering shut.

Natasha's mouth twitches, but she seems to have gotten herself under control. Steve shoots her a quelling glare, which she ignores. "Nice to see you taking one for the team, Cap."

"You don't understand."

She huffs. "You got that right."

"He's _Bucky_."

Natasha opens and shuts her mouth, and for once, it looks like he's surprised her. "How is that possible?"

His confusion comes out as belligerence. "I don't know. Why don't you tell me?" 

"There were rumors that he was originally American," she says, after a long silence, punctuated by the sound of walls crumbling. "He taught me how to speak English like an American." 

"But that still doesn't explain how a man who died in the Forties is here today, looking almost exactly the same as the last time I saw him."

Dust rains down on them and Bucky murmurs in Russian again. His eyes are still closed but then he says, "I'll protect you," and pats Steve's chest. Natasha snickers.

Steve ignores him, concentrating all his attention on Natasha.

Natasha's mouth twists from amusement to disgust. "Department X had advanced cryonics facilities. The Winter Soldier was their greatest success, their most valuable asset, because he could fake being an American so well that even the Americans couldn't tell the difference. So they kept him in stasis between missions, sometimes for years at a time."

"You flatter me, Natashenka."

"Shut up, Yasha." It sounds strangely affectionate, though, and Steve watches her carefully, because he can see the strain around her eyes, and in the tightness of her mouth.

"You're just jealous that the Captain is mine."

Natasha rolls her eyes. "Yes, that's exactly what's going on here."

They're out of the building now, and SHIELD agents are herding handcuffed HYDRA personnel into vans. 

"Is this he?" Thor asks, landing beside them. "The fabled Soldier of Winter?"

"He's Bucky," Steve insists again.

Bucky lifts his head. "Who is this Bucky you keep going on about?" His speech a little slurred now. "Will I have to fight him for you? Because I will. Or Natasha can fight him. She's the best I ever trained. I will share you with her, if she likes." 

"Captain America is having a threesome with famous Russian assassins?" And there's Tony weighing in. "Jarvis, we are totally tweeting this." 

"Tony, no," Steve snaps. It comes out louder than he'd planned.

Natasha lays a hand on his arm. "It's okay. Pepper won't approve it and her staff vets all Tony's tweets."

"Curses," Tony says, retracting his faceplate and smirking at Steve, "Foiled again."

Bucky passes out again and they manage to get him in the quinjet; Natasha does something--"It won't hurt him," she says, "it just makes him unable to use the arm, which is safer for all of us."--and then claps a set of handcuffs on him, as well.

"I'll build him a new one if he needs it," Tony says. "To make up for the fact that you've roofied him."

Steve groans and buries his face in his hands. It's going to be a long ride back to the Helicarrier.

*

There's a tense moment halfway through the flight when Bucky wakes up--really wakes up, not feeling amorous at all--but Steve jabs him with the second syrette and he conks out again, his arms still handcuffed behind his back but his head resting on Steve's thigh. Steve strokes his hair gently, relearning his face by touch, every curve and arch of it loved and familiar.

"What does he keep saying?" he asks Natasha when she sits down on Bucky's other side.

"He's calling you his little bunny." Her mouth quirks into a brief, wistful smile that disappears so quickly Steve's not even sure he really saw it. She reaches out, her hand hovering over Bucky's hair, and Steve thinks it's the only time he's ever seen her hesitate. He nods once, though he knows it's not his place to give permission. She accepts it, though, and brushes Bucky's hair off his forehead, which has gone pale and clammy as the second dose of the drug works through his system. "He never called me that." 

"You were--You and he--"

"It was a long time ago. He was very kind to me. One of the few people who ever was, in those days." She blinks and the faraway look in her eyes gives way to a long, assessing look she levels at Steve. "I should have warned you that he might metabolize drugs faster than normal."

"Did they--" Steve swallows hard. "Is it the serum? Did they figure it out?"

She shakes her head. "From what I know, he already had some variation of it in his system when Department X got hold of him."

"Zola," Steve whispers. "Zola used him as a lab rat during the war. I went AWOL to rescue him--the 107th, I mean--and I found him strapped to a table in Zola's lab."

"So this really was déjà vu all over again for you," Clint says from where he's piloting the quinjet.

"I don't remember there being any Cap and Bucky sexytimes in the stories I heard," Tony pipes up. "Dear old Dad never mentioned that, and he talked about you a lot." He cocks his head thoughtfully. "Well, he talked about _you_ a lot. Not so much Barnes over there."

Steve sighs. "That's because there wasn't. Anything...sexy, I mean, between us back then. He's my best friend, though. Always has been." He avoids the mention of Howard--he appreciates Tony making the effort and he's not going to make things more awkward if he can help it. "Which is just going to make this even more embarrassing when he wakes up."

"I think he's got a lot more to worry about than groping Captain America while under the influence," Bruce says. 

Tony looks over at him. "I thought you were asleep."

Bruce shrugs a shoulder and says, "Eh, I'm awake now."

"And who among us hasn't wanted to grope Cap?" Tony says. 

Steve pretends that's rhetorical. "Can you fix him? The way you fixed Clint after Loki?" he asks Natasha.

She shakes her head. "He's suffered through years and years of having his memories wiped and new ones implanted. I'm not sure there's anything left of your friend underneath all that."

"Or that you'd be doing him any favors by bringing him back," Bruce says. "If even half of what was in that dossier is true..."

"It is," Natasha says.

"Well," Bruce takes his glasses off and cleans them on his shirt, "would you want Bucky to have to live with that?"

"But it wasn't him," Steve says.

"Yeah, I know that and you know that," Bruce says, replacing his glasses and finally meeting Steve's gaze. "But if he really is the man you remember, you'll have a hell of a time convincing him of that."

Steve sits back in his seat and closes his eyes, his hand still resting in Bucky's hair. He doesn't want to think about that.

*

Steve has a few choice words for Fury when they land on the Helicarrier, and he doesn't really care who hears them. He's got an arm around Bucky, who's trussed up like a Thanksgiving turkey and leaning against him, when Fury meets them on deck. He's grinning, which is one of the scarier sights Steve has seen.

"Mission accomplished, sir," Steve says, "but if you ever attempt to dose any of my people with your date rape drugs, there will be trouble between us."

Fury blinks. "Excuse me?"

"The side effects of the sedative you gave me to use on the Winter Soldier." Steve attempts to get Bucky further upright. "Also, the fact that you neglected to mention that he's actually Bucky Barnes."

Fury glances away for just a second before he goes back to staring Steve down. "Those rumors were unsubstantiated, and we were afraid your performance would be impaired if you knew."

"Yeah, it's not his performance you need to be worried about," Tony says, clapping Steve on the shoulder as he walks by. "I meant what I said about the arm."

Fury motions at some guards, but Steve shakes his head. "Natasha and I will escort him to the brig. And I'll be monitoring his confinement closely, Director. He's not going to disappear into some black box prison while I'm around."

The walk is slow, because Bucky's still mostly out of it, as well as chained hand and foot now, at Fury's insistence. It gives them time to explain what happened, and for Fury to agree to let Steve sit in on the deprogramming sessions. "As long as it doesn't upset Barnes," he specifies. 

"I think I can agree to that," Steve answers. 

He walks Bucky into the cell they've set up for him, smaller and more comfortable than the one Fury'd had built for the Hulk, and once Bucky's sitting on the cot, he kneels down to unchain his feet. He tries really hard not to think about what else he could do for Bucky in this position, if he were in his right mind, and actually interested.

Bucky's eyes snap open, and he reaches out and then snatches his hand back, like he's afraid to touch Steve, which is kind of ridiculous after the prolonged groping that's been going on. 

"Steve?" Bucky's voice is hoarse, but it's recognizably, _undeniably_ Bucky's, no hint of the Russian accent that had been there earlier.

Steve meets his gaze in shock. "Yeah. Yeah, Bucky, it's me." He takes Bucky's hand and brings it to his face, pressing his cheek to the warm palm.

Bucky gives him a weak smile, and then his eyes flutter closed, and he tips over onto his side on the cot. Steve's hands shake as he unlaces Bucky's boots and swings his legs up onto the cot for him, and before he leaves the cell, he brushes Bucky's hair back and presses a light kiss to his forehead.

Things are going to work out somehow. Steve's sure of it.

end


End file.
